One Day in May - Catherine Alliott [101]
‘What?’ Ivan peeled himself off the doorframe. Came languidly in and sat down on the bed. ‘Watches telly in Laura’s playroom? With a bacon sandwich? Waits a few hours for his mother to finish her business trip and get back tomorrow as planned? Doesn’t actually curtail her plans because he’s been out of order? You’ve at least got a booking on tomorrow’s crossing, unlike today, when you’ve got a sweltering ten-hour drive from here to Calais, and then how d’you know you’ll get on the ferry? And what are you going to do when you arrive back in the middle of the night anyway – wake him up? Remonstrate with him? For heaven’s sake stick to plan A and stop panicking.’
‘Ivan, I am not panicking.’ I swung around, fists clenched. ‘All I know is Seffy needs me, right now. I feel it here,’ I thumped my heart, ‘OK?’ I glared at him. ‘And don’t worry, I’ll pay our way out of here.’
His face tautened with anger at this. That was uncalled for, unnecessary, and I knew I was lashing out, losing it, that I’d hurt him. But I’d snapped my moorings. I spotted a few bits of underwear under the bed, but my case was already zipped and overstuffed so I threw them in my handbag. I dragged my luggage to the door. Ivan watched in silence. Not, I noticed, offering to carry my bag out and downstairs to the lorry – no, he let me struggle on down on my own.
I arrived in reception in a heap and rang the little bell on the counter violently, meanwhile rooting in my bag for my credit card.
A beautifully coiffed madame appeared. She regarded me with interest, and I had the impression she’d been listening to the fracas on the first floor via her open reception window all along. Enviably chic, eyebrows raised, she attended to this stressed-out Englishwoman – crazy hair, crazy eyes, crazy clothes thrown on in a hurry, black pants showing through white linen trousers – who’d no doubt been jilted by her handsome young gigolo upstairs and was hurrying out to her lorry even now. Lorry! Alors, these English women, no style. She seemed to be trailing items of a personal nature too, as the zip on her overstuffed bag burst.
‘Madame, madame…’ She tripped elegantly after me in pencil skirt and kitten heels, offering dirty underwear, a man’s deodorant because these days I needed the extra protection it afforded. Taking them from her I glanced up and saw Ivan, leaning over the balcony, smoking a cigarette, calmly witnessing the scene.
Muttering my thanks to madame, who, I felt, was off to wash her hands pronto, I climbed into the cab. Thank God the lorry started – it didn’t always – and thank God it was pointing in the right direction too, because a three-point turn in this vehicle was not easy. At least I could perform one, though, unlike Maggie, who, on one memorable occasion when I hadn’t been with her, had got lost in the Dordogne, and simply carried on until she found a roundabout – sixty miles – which unfortunately was a mini one on a council estate, so she’d ended up in someone’s sitting room.
I pulled out into a stream of traffic amidst blaring horns, and drove off down the dusty road. There. Thank God. At least I was on my way. At least I was doing something.
Five miles out of Valensole, though, I metaphorically hit my forehead with the heel of my hand. Madness. Complete and utter madness. Ivan had been right, of course he had. I shouldn’t panic. I should go later, on the crossing I’d prebooked, not turn up and hope for the best. And of course there was nothing I’d be able to do when I arrived at four in the morning and Seffy was fast asleep. I should conclude my business here, and go tomorrow. Damn. What had I been thinking of? Well, half of me, I knew, had been acting on impulse: on kneejerk, maternal reaction. The other half… what? Had been waiting for Ivan to take the lorry keys from me? Confiscate my passport? Some masterful